ITIC TRAINING PROGRAMME (ITP) – LAC PTWC New Products

2 - 4 June 2014,
Guayaquil, Ecuador

The Pacific Ocean and its adjacent seas is the largest, most diverse and most prone to tsunamis of all the Earth’s oceans. Pacific nations must be prepared to face the dangers of tsunami from distant, regional and local sources.

Over the last 10+ years, with improvements in data quality, quantity, and real-time availability, PTWC’s response time has dropped significantly from an hour to < 10 minutes for distant events. At the same time, with each great earthquake and tsunami since 26 December 2004 helping to increase scientific understanding, better techniques have been developed to quickly characterize the earthquake and numerically model the tsunami. This in turn has led to significant improvements in a warning center’s ability to accurately forecast coastal wave height and impact, and an ability to provide timely advice to support local tsunami warning decision-making.

At its 25th session of the Intergovernmental Coordination Group for the Pacific Ocean Tsunami Warning and Mitigation System (ICG/PTWS), Vladivostok, Russian Federation, 9-11 September 2013, Member States approved the start of the PTWC Enhanced Products on October 1, 2014. These products, the first large-scale modifications in decades, fundamentally change the way in which countries assess their national tsunami threats. The PTWC will cease providing Warnings and Watches, and instead issue tsunami wave forecasts. Public text products will continue to be issued, but the additional graphical and statistical products will only be sent to designated PTWS Tsunami Warning Focal Points.

This 3-day training will cover the explanation and use of the PTWC New Enhanced Tsunami Forecast Products by National Tsunami Warning Centers and Emergency Response Agencies. Topics will cover the end-to-end warning process, warning center and emergency response standard operating procedures and their challenges, advanced topics in warning operations, and the methodologies, limitations, and interpretation of the PTWC Enhanced Products.